


Where Only The Sweetest Words Remain

by pjobroadwayslut14



Category: The Gentleman's Guide to Vice and Virtue Series - Mackenzi Lee
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst, Bruises, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, M/M, The boys are hurting, josee is in this and she’s a queen as always
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-14
Updated: 2021-02-14
Packaged: 2021-03-15 15:15:56
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,549
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29438136
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pjobroadwayslut14/pseuds/pjobroadwayslut14
Summary: Monty’s father is giving him a hard time again, so Percy’s there to help.Title from “Turning Page” by Sleeping at Last
Relationships: Henry "Monty" Montague/Percy Newton
Comments: 4
Kudos: 23
Collections: TGGTVAV Valentine's Collection 2021





	Where Only The Sweetest Words Remain

**Author's Note:**

> hi! this is my thing for the valentines collection! happy valentine’s day <3
> 
> tw:
> 
> implied/referenced child abuse

_ Once upon a-  _

No, that’s terrible. Start with a question maybe?

_ When I wake up, I’m- _

That has… nothing to do with what I had planned. Do I even have anything planned? God, why am I even taking this class?

Maybe it’s because it looked fun. Maybe it’s because it’s junior year, I refuse to take a study hall, and my musician brain saw the word “creative” in “creative writing” and ran with it.

I click back to the assignment tab and pretend I haven’t already reread the directions twelve times. The teacher just wants us to free write a short story. Should be a piece of cake, right? 

Wrong. So,  _ so,  _ wrong. Also, it’s thirty points added to my grade, which is already in the dumps as it is. No big deal.

Everyone else in the class was overjoyed when the teacher announced the assignment. It’s an easy grade booster for them. They’re probably enjoying it too.

If only they let me take another period of orchestra. 

I sigh, navigating back to the blank document sitting in front of me. The teacher didn’t specify what  _ kind  _ of story it had to be. Maybe I’ll just write about a life experience or something. However, I doubt Mr. Lockwood wants to hear about how I dealt with the trauma of falling off of my bike in fourth grade for ten pages. Minimum.  _ Ten page minimum.  _

Just as I’m getting ready to gently shut the laptop and start ugly crying, my phone starts buzzing beside me. With no hesitation whatsoever, I pick it up and press  _ accept _ without even looking at the ID.

I’m much less grateful for the distraction when the caller starts speaking. “Hey, Percy,” Felicity says, calm laced into her voice. Less laced actually, more  _ forcibly shoved _ , like a puzzle piece into a place where it doesn’t fit. 

I straighten without meaning to. “Hi. Is everything okay?”

I know something’s up, I just figure I’ll ask to be polite.

I hear a hushed voice on the other side of the line, and the shuffling of fabric. “Everything is fine, I’m just calling to ask if you could come pick Monty up.”

As if on instinct, I spring up from my bed and start searching for my keys. When I realize what I’m doing, or maybe  _ why _ I’m doing it in the first place, I pause. “Why? Is he okay?”

“Just- He’s fine but-“ She pauses. “Please,” she mumbles, in a rare show of genuine concern for her brother. 

“Yeah- Yeah of course. I’ll be there as soon as I can.” 

“Thank you,” she finishes, then hangs up the phone. With that, I jump back into action, stuffing my keys into my pocket. The pocket of my  _ pajama  _ pants, damn it.

I throw on a pair of sweatpants at lightning speed, sticking the keychain in the pocket. I hit my light switch way too hard on the way out and slam the door closed. 

Shit.

As soon as my mom spots me running down the stairs, she asks, “Where do you think you’re off to slamming the door like that? This house is gonna fall apart one of these days.”

Without looking up, I frantically slide on my shoes. “Sorry Mama, I can’t talk right now.”

She steps into the corner of my vision with her eyebrows raised, hands on her hips. “I’d like to know why you’re in such a rush, young man.”

A pang of annoyance shoots through me. “I’m sorry I’m just- I’ll be right back, okay?” I sigh.

Thankfully, she seems to understand. She walks forward slowly, too slow for my liking right now, and puts her hand on my cheek. “Okay baby, I trust you. Be safe, take my car.”

All of the annoyance is gone, replaced with warm gratitude. I kiss her on the cheek, and the moment I’m out the front door, all of my prior urgency returns. 

Monty’s sitting on his porch steps when I pull up to his house a few minutes later. He’s wearing a sweatshirt with the hoodie pulled over his head, completely covering his hair. Something must be  _ really  _ wrong then. 

I pull into the driveway and he shields his eyes from my glaring headlights with his arm, looking over for the first time. The light from the car illuminates his overly pale and red face. 

That’s when I notice the bruise. Bruises, actually. His entire right cheek is covered in mean purple, blood staining the pale white that peeks through. My eyes widen and I throw open my car door. Cold rain sprinkles down on me as I rush toward him.

Just as I reach out to take him in my arms, he stands and pushes past me. “ _ Not here,” _ he mumbles. 

Realization washes over me like a gut punch and I’m paralyzed in place.  _ His father.  _ It had to have been.

I try to tell myself to act surprised. Act like this is the first time and it’s a new thing we can stop right at the source. But it’s not. 

What hurts the most is that it’s  _ not  _ a surprise. First time it happened, I was too young to do something that mattered.  _ Say  _ something that mattered. 

I can't go back in time. I wish this wasn’t a regular thing for a myriad of reasons. One of them is that maybe _ now _ , I could do something to convince him that he does  _ not  _ deserve this. Something to carry in his pocket and hold onto in case it happened again. I missed my chance, and now he’s too far gone. Every time it happens, I repeat the same things I’ve said since we were thirteen. They just bounce off of him, hitting the bruises in the process.

Monty turns around once he reaches the car, hand gripping the door handle. I watch a few tears fall down his cheek. Without even bothering to wipe them away, he tilts his head and gives me a desperate, pleading expression. 

That look is like the antidote to the glue sticking me to the driveway, and my legs carry me to the driver’s side. I unlock the car, and the  _ second  _ the lock clicks, Monty rips open the door and falls inside. 

I shut my own door beside me and turn the key in the ignition, keeping an eye on him the entire time. He’s taken on a balled up position, making himself as small as he can. He ducks his head between his knees. I hesitantly reach an arm out to calm his shaking shoulders. Bad idea, because when it makes contact with his skin he flinches away on instinct.

I slowly withdraw my hand and set it on the wheel.  _ Fuck. _

The walk from my car to my front door is awkward and drawn out. When I parked, Monty straightened up reluctantly after a second or two of my eyes boring into his neck. Careful to keep the bruised side of his face angled away in shame, he pushed open the car door. The weirdest part about it is the fact that he didn’t move afterward. Just stood there, letting the now-heavy rain pound down on him. Maybe it was cooling on his face, or he just didn’t care about getting soaked.

I do care, though, so I gently walked him up to the front steps. I keep him pressed against my side as I fumble with the keys. Turns out the door is still unlocked from when I left, so I just push it open. 

I’m aware that he’s  _ heavily  _ disassociated at the moment. I’m sure that’s why Felicity called me and didn’t put him on the phone too. It’s strange seeing him this way. Quiet, reserved, it’s like I’m holding onto a completely different person. 

But he’s not a different person. Which is why, after kicking off my own, I gently nudge him to take off his shoes at the door. He shivers, definitely now freezing from the icy rain, and slides them off.

Just then, my mother walks into the living room where we’re standing. She glances at Monty with a grin before turning her back to us to search for something in a drawer. 

“Monty, I haven’t seen you in so long! How’ve you been, baby?” she asks with a warm tone, still facing away.

Usually, something like that would stop Monty in his tracks. Him and my mother would strike up a conversation, despite only going a week or so without seeing each other. I would pretend to be annoyed as I dragged him upstairs. Right now, I wish nothing more than for me to be pulling him away, as opposed to his urgent tugs on my hand right now. I oblige him almost immediately, caught off guard by the way he keeps the bruised side of his face tucked into the hood of his sweatshirt and his eyes down at the floor.

Mama turns around with the lack of an answer and the smile from before drops. She takes a mental step back, tipping her head and looking at me as I follow him up the stairs. I shoot her a look that says  _ I’m sorry _ , and she understands immediately. Thank god, because I  _ really  _ don’t feel like talking to anyone other than him about this right now.

“Tell me if you need anything,” she finishes, nodding her head before turning back into the kitchen. She must be making dinner. Good, at least now I can make sure he eats something.

Monty keeps tugging, and I follow him up the stairs. This hasn’t happened in a while. Not once since we started dating two months ago. Maybe it’s because it sort of ended the entire “sleeping around” thing for him. Not that that’s a valid reason, who knows how his father’s mind works. 

We thought it was over for good. We thought that he would “grow out of” that kind of thing as he got older.  _ We thought. _

The question of  _ why _ it happened again won’t stop bouncing around in my brain. I can’t ask him, I won’t, not now anyway. If he tells me himself, that’ll be it. 

Monty flops down on the edge of my bed as soon as we enter my bedroom. I flick the lamp on and sit down next to him. It’s silent for a second, or maybe a minute or two, like time stops. And then a dam breaks. 

It starts off slow. He starts to sniffle beside me, so I instinctively grab his hand closest to me. I watch as everything registers in his mind, then he ducks his head. Immediately following the action, a few whimpers come out. I squeeze his hand and pull him into my chest. 

I don’t know how long he’s been holding in these tears. I’m assuming since, or even before, his bastard of a father laid a hand on him. Or a fist.

I try to block out the sound of him sobbing as to not start crying myself. It’s not fair, any of it. There is nothing he would do that would ever warrant this. He grips my hand like a vice, and I run a gentle hand up and down his arm. 

He continues to cry like that for a while. Every once and awhile, it’ll get bad enough that no sound even comes out when he sobs. That’s when I’ll lean down and whisper comforting words into his hair, laying kisses down in between. I have to remind him to keep breathing a few times.

Eventually, his breathing slows and he tires himself out. I don’t move away or try to push him off of me. We sit there long after he stops crying, me holding him with his head tucked into my chest. 

“I love you,” I whisper, ducking my head to kiss the crown of his.

“I love you too,” he mumbles, occupied by playing with the string of my hoodie.

I sit up and guide his face to mine. Honestly, he looks like a wreck. An absolute disaster. Hair sticking out of the hood of his hoodie, every spot on his face either red or purple, puffy eyes. I lean forward and leave a lingering kiss on his forehead. When I pull away, I say, “We’ve got to get you changed. These clothes are all wet and cold, you’re gonna get sick.”

He rolls his eyes quickly at my doting tone, so fast you wouldn’t be able to catch it if you blinked, with a subtle smile. It causes me to grin a little. My Monty’s still in there somewhere. He breaks our gaze to nod and stand up. He tries to stretch once he does, then winces back in pain. 

“Careful,” I warn, moving over to my dresser to get a clean pair of pajamas. He’s left a lot of clothes here over the years, I  _ could  _ give him some of those. Instead, I reach into my drawer and pull out a pair of my own sweatpants and a hoodie. 

As I’m about to turn around to give them to him, a pair of arms wrap around my middle. I lean into them, stroking Monty’s clasped hands with my fingertips. “Come on,” I say, twisting around to hand them to him. 

“I don’t really  _ need  _ to change, I’m fine,” he lies, stepping away from my offer. His voice is rough and scratchy. 

I tilt my head. “You’ll feel better.” I grin at him, to which he raises an eyebrow. “Also, maybe I’ll let you steal them and pretend not to notice,” I propose.

I swear I see his pupils dilate when I say that. He reaches out, wincing at the sudden movement. I step closer to him so he doesn’t have to lift his arms as much and press the pile into his hands. 

After that, I put on some music to fill the silence. Clair de Lune, nice and calming. 

“ _ Fuck _ ,” Monty hisses. I look up from Spotify and gasp lightly. He has unzipped his wet sweatshirt and thrown it off to the side already. Monty’s shirt is up around his shoulders, his arms frozen in place as he groans at the pain.

I spring up immediately, rushing over to him. Of  _ course  _ he didn’t ask for help. Now he’s wincing grimly and trying to lift the shirt over his head by himself, stopping every couple of seconds to whimper.

“Hey, stop, you’re hurting yourself,” I say, grabbing his hands and stopping him from going any further. 

“Damn it,” he mumbles, allowing me to lower his hands. 

I cup his jaw and shrug. “Just let me help.”

Monty leans into my touch and looks up at me through his lashes. Even with half his face covered with bruises and streaks of dried blood, he’s still the most beautiful view I’ve ever had the privilege to take in.

I step back and take the bottom hem of his shirt in my hands. I slowly lift it up as to not stretch his arms out too much. “I know it hurts,” I murmur, furrowing my brow as I drop the ends and try a new approach. 

He laughs, humorless and sarcastic. “Do you?” he asks.

I roll my eyes fondly and look him in the eyes. “You’ve been struggling this entire time. It didn’t take much to assume,” I come back, dryly. He’s caught off guard and starts to blush. As a statement of surrender from our little back and forth, I lean forward to peck the tip of his nose.

I reset my hands on the hems and bring them up. His breath catches as my fingers brush his ribs. My eyes flit down to his now bare sides and I gasp. 

Just below his ribs on the right side is a mean looking blue and purple bruise to match the ones on his face. Anger spikes through me and I blink rapidly at it, unable to look Monty in the eyes.

“ _ Please _ don’t start crying,” he says. I glance up at him. Oh, my eyes are watering. When did that start? I reach up and wipe them roughly.

“Sorry.”

Monty tips his head and smiles. “It’s okay, Darling.” The smile drops gradually and he furrows his brow. “Can we please get this over with though? I’m freezing.”

I raise my eyebrow. “I thought you didn’t want to change?”

He blushes. “Well, now that you’ve seen,” he gestures to the bruised side with the opposite hand, “it doesn’t really matter.”

My heart cracks a little at that. I’m praying he didn’t think I would kick him out or tease him for what happened, but this isn’t exactly a  _ high _ in his mental health. I kiss him on the forehead, pressing my lips to the spot and closing my eyes. “Please don’t worry about that. And yes, I can do it now.”

We do eventually get his shirt off and the clean one  _ on _ . Between those two points, Monty smirked and sang-sung, “Your turn,” in an attempt to lighten everything up. I doubt we are going to achieve the normal jokey-light vibe tonight. 

The song I put on before has long ended, so I reshuffle a different playlist and set my phone on the charger. Monty stands in front of me, rolling up the waist-band of the pants he’s borrowing and triple tying the strings. 

When he’s satisfied, he collapses onto the bed next to me with a sigh. He must be tired. No,  _ exhausted.  _ Between school earlier today and… everything that must have happened afterward, he’s definitely ready to hibernate for the weekend. Fine by me, I’m intent on not letting him go back to that house for as long as possible.

My hand automatically travels to his hair, running through it gently. He sighs, and the corner of my lip twists upward in a sad smile. 

Cupping the back of his head like a pillow, I stretch my back out and shake my head. “Will you let me clean out the cut?”

Monty opens his eyes and looks up at me blankly. “Do I have a choice?”

“Let me, and we can go to sleep right afterward. Or watch a movie, your choice.”

He blinks sleepily but his eyes still light up. “I get to pick?”

Already regretting this. “Yes,” I sigh. I already know it’s going to be-

“ _ Fast and Furious? _ ” he asks. I groan and hit the back of my head against the wall behind me. Monty giggles and burrows further into my hand. “You said I could pick.”

“I know. Remember my end of the bargain?” I lift my hand from behind him and use it to brush his hair out of his eyes. 

“If you must, do it now.”

My mom is still shuffling around the kitchen when I walk downstairs. At the notice of my footsteps, she looks up from the cupboard and frowns. “Do you need something?” she asks, sweetly.

I run a hand through my hair. “Just a bandaid.”

The frown deepens and she picks up a mug from the countertop, taking a sip. She sets it back down and leans against the island. “I’m so sorry.”

I walk over to the junk drawer under the microwave. “Why?”

“Neither one of you should have to be going through what you are right now. You’re too young.”

I look up from my shuffling, holding a bandaid and an alcohol wipe. “Mama, I’m seventeen.”

She tips her head and gives me a sad smile. I know that no matter how old I get, I’ll always be her “baby”. Perks of being an only child, I guess. Not really though, because Monty’s basically lived here in his free time since we met in kindergarten. He might as well be part of the family as well. Our parents hate each other, but Monty’s parents’ general disregard for him outweighs that. 

Most of our time together is spent here. More so lately, since we started dating. I’m not allowed in his house anymore. At least, not when his parents are around to know I’m there. Monty will still sneak me in on the nights they’re away. Felicity, bless her, turns a blind eye most days. 

My mom shakes her head, the warm mug cupped between her palms. “Doesn’t matter.” She nods to the alcohol pad. “Make sure you’re being gentle,” she warns.

“I know, Mama,” I say, passing by her into the threshold of the living room. With one hand on the stair’s banister, I look back at her. “Is it alright if Monty sleeps over tonight? Maybe tomorrow too, I still have to ask him.”

I already know her answer before she even says anything. “Of course, he’s always welcome over here.”

“Thanks,” I say, turning on my heel and hopping up the stairs.

Monty has shifted to lay back against my headboard when I step through the door. The warm lamplight washes over the room, and I’m getting sleepy because of the atmosphere alone. He’s playing with the tied-yarn end of my blanket. He punctuates every movement with a set of heavy blinks.

“Stay awake for five more minutes,” I joke, sitting down on the bed. I could pass out just as easily as he looks like he’s about to. It’s pathetic, seeing that it’s only ten at night. It’s the end of January. Everyone’s extra tired then, right?

Monty groans, dropping the blanket and rubbing his good eye with his knuckles. I beckon him closer to me, and he scoots forward. His face is right up to mine, completely deadpanned. I can’t say I blame him. 

“This is going to sting,” I warn, tearing open the packet and pulling a wipe out of it. 

Monty lets out what sounds like a scoff mixed with a laugh. Whatever it is, it’s unenthusiastic. “You act like we’ve never done this before.”

I wince. He’s always used “humor” to mask his issues or lighten up a situation. It’s not particularly fun for me, but I don’t say anything. If this is how he copes, it’s how he copes. “Sorry,” he mumbles.

The cut isn’t very big, just a spot over one of the bruises where his skin broke, but you can never be too safe. I lay a lingering kiss on his lips as preparation, then touch the alcohol to his cut. He sucks in air through his teeth, then let’s out the breath in a sigh once I bring the wipe away. “Yeah, that part never gets better,” he laughs, willowy and relieved. 

A smile tugs at the corner of my lips, and Monty leans up to kiss it. I have to tell myself not to let the grin grow any bigger for fear of breaking out of one of the sweetest kisses I’ve ever received. My hand finds its way up to cup his jaw. He sighs into it, and I allow myself a few more seconds of bliss before pulling away. 

There’s absolutely no way I’m not blushing, so I keep my head angled down while I fiddle with the bandaid. He notices this, and snorts. My heart flutters with a sliver of relief.

He stares at me the entire time I apply the bandaid. My eyes flit up a few times, but then immediately back down when he starts smirking.  _ He’s enjoying this _ , I think. Oh well, it’s been a rough day. 

Once I’ve finished, I lean back on my hands. We both gaze into each other’s eyes for who knows how long. Not speaking, though there is so much to say.  _ I love you. You don’t deserve this. _

_ It’s not your fault. _

Even if his mouth is smiling, Monty’s eyes are sad. His eyes are like the ocean, how they can so easily switch from bright and sparkling to cloudy and dark. If I can’t even bear looking into them right now, I can’t even imagine how he must feel.

My mom was right, we’re too young for any of this. It’s a Friday night. We should be out watching a movie or driving through town, screaming our favorite songs at the tops of our lungs.  _ It’s not fair.  _

I reach out across my comforter, and he wordlessly sets his hand into mine. The air around us has grown solemn. It’s crushing, like the weight of everything on the tips of our tongues is hanging over us and pressing down. He slices it apart by clearing his throat. “You uh- You got to my house quick.”

“Yeah. I was worried about you.”

Silence.

“What were you doing?” he asks. 

Without letting go of his hand, I crawl down the bed and sit beside him. I slide down a bit to make it so that I can comfortably lay my head on his shoulder. 

“I had homework for English. Short story.”

He whistles quietly to himself. “On the weekend?”

“Yeah, I know right! Lockwood is  _ merciless.”  _ I tuck my head into his neck. 

I wish the music was still playing. He probably turned it off when I went downstairs. The only things filling the silence are his shaky breaths and the occasional shuffling of fabric.

“What’s it about?” he asks, sounding genuinely curious. I can’t exactly tell him  _ Nothing! I didn’t get a chance to start it yet because when I was trying to, your sister called me. Now you’re here and every second it gets harder to stave off tears because I love you so much, and it hurts to see you in so much pain. _

__ Too much of a mouthful. Instead, I kiss the spot where my lips touch his neck.

“It’s about a boy,”

Kiss.

“A brave one, bravest most handsome knight in the whole kingdom.”

I kiss the spot where his jaw connects to his ear. He shivers and I continue, “The problem is he was raised by horrible trolls. Mean,” kiss, “ugly,” kiss, “trolls,” kiss, all of them in the same spot. Monty snickers through his nose.

I raise myself up to press my lips against his cheek. “The trolls weren’t nice to the knight, so he spent all of his time with the court’s musician.”

“You’re flattering yourself,” he trails off, voice cracking on the last syllable.

I ignore him, climbing over his lap. I kiss the tip of his nose and then press our foreheads together. His eyes are glossy again. I look straight into them as I add, “So one day the musician and his lovely knight are going to run away and the trolls will never hurt them ever again. They just have to wait one more year, and then they’re free. But the musician knows that the knight will be able to do it, he  _ is  _ the strongest boy the musician has ever met.”

With that, Monty lets go of my hand to take the back of my neck in both of his. A tear has shed from each of his eyes. They polish the purple of the bruises like the finish on a painting. A beautiful painting, one that people drop everything to go see. “I love you,” he whispers.

“I love you too,” I manage to get out, just before he uses his hands on my neck to pull me into him.

**Author's Note:**

> hi! hope you liked it leave me a comment and kudos if you did!


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